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About

MANTRA ARDHANA

Mantra, , was born on the 22nd August 1971 on the Indonesian island Lombok. He is of Balinese Hindu descent and an active painter and musician.
In a very young age he was struck by polio and since then he depends on a wheel chair.
Mantra’s determination and will power alone made him the outstan… Read More

MANTRA ARDHANA

Mantra, , was born on the 22nd August 1971 on the Indonesian island Lombok. He is of Balinese Hindu descent and an active painter and musician.
In a very young age he was struck by polio and since then he depends on a wheel chair.
Mantra’s determination and will power alone made him the outstanding talent he now is.
In 1989 he visited the Fine Arts High School in Batu Bulan, Bali for 4 years and was then accepted by the prestigious Indonesian Institute of Arts in Yogyakarta. He graduated in 1999 with a BA in Fine Arts.
After graduation he returned to his home island Lombok realizing that this beautiful and colorful island comprised of enormous richness in traditional elements interesting to implement into his art forms.
He then started to experiment with different concepts creating music combined with visual art using his own perspective.
Mantra’s aim is to bring the rather unknown ethnic elements of his island’s music on the global map for music lovers to appreciate unique traditional elements combined with contemporary accents with an aura of contemporary world music and those elements working in conjunction with other multicultural aspects.

Regarding his art, Mantra says:

"I have been consciously searching for some principles in my artistic life. The search has been among abstract issues manifesting themselves as spontaneous symbols resulting from the mind so severely repressed by automatism. They generally bring forth the language of the body by reflex, as I have myself experienced it."
Among the symptoms of automatism are the dream world; a term ordinarily associated by some people with communication between the unconscious and the psyche and last but not least the “language of body”.
Mantra’s future project evolves around the “Organic Mind” and he created a collection of visual art works focusing on this issue for his solo exhibition in Yogyakarta December 2010.
In February 2010 he wrote the music for the “New Life” concept performed in Lombok by a group of local artists in conjunction with the Australian curator Beverley Hornibrook. “New Life” was part of an international Artist in Residence Program and included elements of visual art and performing art.
The idea of the “Unknown World” concept emerged partly from the “New Life” creation and later the idea of “Organic Mind” was added to Mantra’s future work project commitment.
Later in 2010 Mantra visited Malaysia to connect with art linked brains and further received a one month work program with the Australian association for Disabled Artists “DAADA” under David Doyle in Perth, West Australia. Read Less